Actually it has nothing to do with cream and it definitely has nothing to do with liquid cream or even liquid + cream. It’s just an absurd name- if you make it my way!

Ras malai is a traditional Indian sweet, originating from West Bengal. God I love the Bengalis for having invented this. It’s my favourite dessert ever.

These tiny balls of cottage cheese are soaked in a creamy milk and sugar and eaten with the milk.

It’s a tricky and complicated recipe BUT this version (handed down by my aunt) is easy, breezy and beautiful (yes it’s a cover-worthy dessert)

What you need:

For the Malai: Creamy balls

1 cup of Nido milk powder (or any other brand)

1 egg

1 + 1/2 tsp baking powder

For the Ras: Milk Syrup

1lt milk

1/2 can unsweetened evaporated milk

1/2 cup sugar

Saffron strands

1 tsp cardamom powder

What to do:

1. Make Ras. Boil everything together and make sure that the flame is med, do not let it burn!

2. Make the malai. Sift the milk powder with baking powder, beat in the egg and knead to form a sticky dough. You may be tempted to add water, but resist the temptation. Form tiny balls (they will swell)

3. Put the balls in the boiling milk and simmer for 15-20 minutes till balls swell up and are soft in the centre.

I tried Za’atar in Kuwait and I fell in love with that stuff. It’s a mix spice with a lot of stuff in it; mint, sesame seeds, oregano, sumaah, thyme, marjoram and a lot of other stuff I can’t figure out. Lucky for me I don’t need to.

I’ve bought enough Za’atar to last for a really long time (smart thinking) But if you can’t get your hands on some of this stuff, then you can try making your own. That link seems to have covered it.

There’s really not much to talk about this recipe. Make it and you shall know.

What you need:

1 red onion

1 ts of ginger + garlic paste and more garlic if you will

about 250 Mix vegetables, or whatever you want to stir fry

2tbs Za’atar

40gm cottage cheese/paneer/tofu

salt as per your taste-buds (or dietary requirements)

1 tbs (good quality) oyster sauce

20gm of grated processed cheese (optnl)

1 tsp oil

What to do:

1. Saute veggies in oil, starting with onions, ginger garlic paste and the harder veggies progressing to the softer ones. Throw in the paneer/tofu/cottage cheese

2. Add salt, oyster sauce and Za’atar. Cover and cook on a low flame for about 7 minutes or so.

Writing a blog is hard work. Ever so often I find my self cooking away or even clicking away but never get the patience to blog about any of it.

I’m going to be reall-ly busy the next one month, it’s Ramadan plus I will be studying like a crazy nut (or at least I should be!) for all the damned exams that I have to give. I’m quite addicted to social networking and useless browsing so I might even unplug my Internet for the month (yikes!)

So I’m scheduling a couple of posts. hopefully you wont miss me too much 😛

Ohh here’s the Cinnamon french toast with poached caramel flavoured apples that I turned out the other day. Ok Ok so I couldn’t resist. I took a bite before I could click the pic, trust me- you would do the same.

Cinnamon toast + poached apple

What you need:

for the french toast:

1 egg

2 slices of white bread

1/2 tsp cinnamon powder

2 tsp sugar

1/8 tsp salt

1/4 cup cold milk

For the poached apples

1 red apple; peeled, cored and sliced(whichever type)

1 small cinnamon stick

3 tbs sugar

1 cup water

1/2 tsp lemon juice

What to do:

1. Make the poached apples. Caramelize 3tbs of sugar in a saucepan and pour a cup of water once caramelized. Reduce heat.

2. Put the lemon juice, cinnamon and apple slices in the saucepan and cook covered for 15 minutes till done.

3. Make the french toast. Beat eggs, cinnamon, sugar, salt and milk. Dip slices of bread and fry in a non stick pan till golden brown on both sides.

4. Serve both together. Pour some of the caramel liquid over the apples and the toast. YUM!

Another fun Top Tens event by Caitlin at Food Nerd. This one’s called ‘Blog Envy’ This month we had to compile a list of the recipes from blogs that we’ve been ‘meaning to make’..So I pulled out my bookmarks folder and sorted to arrive at these top ten recipes… Oh there’s more, we’ve got to make one of the recipes from the list! but before that the list!

And I made the momos! World Foodie Guide’s blog doesn’t quite have a very detailed description of the recipe so I made my own just getting the general idea from the site.

‘Momos’ are a Tibetan version of the dumpling. It’s basically a wet flour wrapper that’s filled with any stuffing you like, mostly ground meat and spices and the dough is folded over the stuffing and pinched together to form a dumpling. These dumplings are steamed and eaten with a dipping sauce.

I had this beautiful red cabbage in my vegetable draw and I tossed it up with equal portions of mushrooms to make the juiciest momos that I’ve ever tasted.